The Prof watching Whisky.

So, this is my mate's dog Whisky.

 

 And this is him talking (sorry, I can't work out how to embed the video here):

<iframe src="https://www.facebook.com/video/embed?video_id=10151398625423046" width="226" height="400" frameborder="0"></iframe>

And this is Barney watching that video:

 

 

What a wuss.

 

 

x

Barney and the Wenallt.

"I know what'll be nice" I thought, "I'll take Barney up the Wenallt".

So I put him in the car and off we go.

He is loving it; frolicking in the bluebells, prancing in the wild garlic, feeling the breeze in his nostrils. Here is a video of Barney enjoying himself, my favourite moment is when he notices the other dog behind him and jumps around (I apologise for my dog voice):

So there he is loving life when suddenly, he gets a little overexcited and disppears.

Gone.

I call his name, shake the treat box, whistle. I think I was ruining everyone elses' quiet morning walk by polluting the silence with:

"Barney!", "BARNEY!", 'a-chuk-a-chuk-a-chuk-a-chuk' (the shaking of the treat box) *whistle* "Baaaaaaaaarney!".

Nothing.

"No worries" I think, "I'll just do a loop track". So, off I go. 10 minutes in, no Barney. I can hear the cars on the nearby road thinking, "please don't be on the road!".

I imagine him chasing butterflies, hunting squirrels, lapping from a babbling brook, generally having the time of his life. All in slow motion with some sort of string quartert backing track, the heady sun beaming through the trees. I get annoyed.

I walk a bit more. "Baaaaarrrnnneeeyyy!"

Nothing.

15 minutes later I'm nearing the car park, ready to loop again, when suddenly he appears out of the foliage.

He looks happy to see me.

"There you are!" I say, clipping him onto his lead, "Damn dog."

Once we've walked the short distance back to the carpark, the woman in the car next to us (who I was chatting to earlier) says, "Oh, he found you then. I thought he might have run off."

I look perplexed.

She says, "He's been sat by your car for about 20 minutes."

It turns out that after realising he may have got a bit out of control, ran too far and lost me, he circled back on himself, found the car, sat by it and stayed put.

A far more sensible option that wandering around in the trees shaking a treat box.

I think I've made my point.

Well, at least one of us had a good walk...

x

Sleepy pictures.

Here's some pictures of Barney sleeping/looking cute. Too nice not to share!

 

Awww.

PS I'll put a poem up tomorrow, it's about a dead body. Yay!

x



Prof. Barnabus von Chocolate - video debut.

Well guys, look at what we have achieved:

He's like a finely tuned obedience machine! Check him out!

And, when he's in the trees, copse, grove, thicket or woody hollow, he even comes out intermittently to check if I'm still there. Awesome.

The only problem is he runs in one bit and then reappears somewhere completely different. A few times, I've been stood there waiting for him and he comes bounding out of the bushes in a completely different area. I think he gets onto a scent trail and goes nuts.

A cyclist was laughing at me as Prof. Barnabus had run through the fence to go for a drink/quick dip in the river, and I was calling and calling him and then I heard him bark, and he was right behind me. He'd found a different hole in the fence to come back through. Tricksy hobbit.

He looks so stoked when he's running around hunting for squirrels, total blissed out expression on his face. Amazing.

x

Operation Australia

Today is Friday (day off!) and on Sunday, my Mum and Mike left for a month long trip to Australia. Which leaves me and the Professor alone - for a whole month...

If I'm going to be honest, the operation did not start well. In an effort to alleviate the stress, I moved my laptop and all my books downstairs so Barnabus has some company. I have now completely taken over the kitchen table with all my texts, save for the space left for the massive chocolate egg which I have to 'share with the others'. At this point, Barney had not come out of his bed.

So, Sunday night and first walk time. I had to reach into his dog-cave, as he pressed himself up against the back wall, and attach his harness while he was in there. Once attached, he came out willingly, but eyed my over his shoulder the entire walk as if to say 'she is STILL following me.'

I did try and take him out into the sunshine as I was making poetry notes in the garden, but as you can see below, Barney was not in the mood for socialising.

Not in the mood at all.

The week seemed to continue this way, until on Tuesday night we had a break through. I went to his bed (where he has taken up permanent residence), and showed him his harness and he jumped right out! Amazing!

So, yesterday I think - 'this is it, he is finally used to me' and after a few experimental, but successful, 'Barney come here!''s I decided to let him off the lead. It initially went well; he ran off, I called him, he came back, I gave him a treat, he ran off, I called him etc but then, he ran off.

Like, properly ran off until he was just a brown blur with a little white bum bouncing around in the distance. I called and called, but he would not come. Off he went, into the bushes, out of the bushes, into the river, under the trees.

'Great' I thought 'half an hour before I have to leave before work and Barney has done a runner'

And it was then I heard the train. I was instantly reminded of the fact that two dogs had been run over on the tracks just recently and was convinced that Barney was careering towards the same fate. My heart began pounding and I felt panicky under my sweltering hot, gigantic winter coat.

And then, he appeared. Looking rather sheepish I might add. I put on my best 'come hither' expression and called him over, handing out a treat.

And over he came.

I clipped the lead on his harness and went to stroke his head but he jumped away, cowering.

It was a stark reminder of the treatment Barney might have suffered at the hands of his previous owners.

So, today I didn't let Barney off the lead. He was calm with the other dogs, let some little kids stroke him and even posed for a few photos:

And then, disaster. Literally seconds after these pictures were taken, two labradors came running over growling and bowled Barney off his feet. He was understandably upset and tried to run off at full pelt, but when the lead reached its maximum he was flung up into the air.

The owners apologised but Barney was terrified. I caught up with him and his heckles were up, his pupils huge and he kept trying to escape. I stroked him for a bit and calmed him down but on the way back, he kept hiding behind me at the approach of any other dogs.

It's a shame that the walk ended that way, just when we were making progress in his confidence.

He's out in the garden now, mulling it over in the sun with his peanut-butter-filled Kong.

Poor pooch.

x

A p.o.e.m

This is a poem about how much Barney hates me:

The Notebook

My dog has a secret notebook,

which he hides in his bed,

inside he writes of many things,

Such as river dips and walks,

And lady dogs and cats,

And circumventing squirrels.

Anything like that.

I’ve never seen his notebook

But I know he writes

in it when nobody is looking.

Page upon page upon page

Of amusing anecdotes

And canine ruminations

In scratchy print.

I often feel him staring at me,

But when I look

he turns his head as if he wasn’t,

He’s thinking what to write

About me his in pad,

Scrawling my name

Over and over.

One time I tried to find it,

But he’d hidden it well.

And when he came back from the garden,

He eyed me suspiciously.

He hasn’t trusted me since.

Barney's first bath.

Last night, Professor Barnabus von Chocolate experienced his first bath - a proper one, not just a hose down in the garden. He behaved very well but shook throughout. Below are the results:

I'm not sure about this.

Why do you do this to me?



Is it over yet?



That's better. Once I'm out of this white box of despair, you won't see me for dust.



x

Colonel Mutz

So, Mum and Mike headed off for the weekend leaving Barney in my allegedly capable hands.


It didn't go well.


Albeit, admittedly less eventful than the previous attempt, (see Christmas post), it would still be filed under U, for unsuccessful.


Barney was a mess; he would not leave his dog-cave, not for anything. I was so concerned that he was spiralling dangerously towards some sort of fatal, internal explosion due to not doing his wees and poos that I devised a plan; I would enter the house, open the garden door, go into the house (avoiding eye contact at all times) and then stand there in absolute silence looking out of the window to see if he'd go out into the garden. I thought that maybe if he thought I wasn't around, he might be brave and go out and do his business (on the concrete I might add, never on the grass, preferably under the washing line or another high traffic area). One time I actually went to the extent of opening the front door and slamming it shut, as some sort of desperate ruse. Barney, however, was having none of it.

I could  occasionally hear, but never see him, eating the doggy biscuits which I dutifully put in his bowl for him and left out treats for him. He wouldn't actually take these from my hand so I ended up just putting them in his bed next to him whilst patting him on the head, whilst he eyed me suspiciously and whined feverishly at my shockingly close proximity.

I almost fully expected him to revert back to his feral state or pull a Colonel Kurtz and go nuts. Each morning I would peer tentatively into his abode, trying to pull my best endearing/trustworthy expression whilst temptingly shaking his lead. My efforts came to no avail.

Part of me feared that one morning I'd look in and he'd be pushed right up against the back wall in the shadows with his little belly hanging out. He'd have a little bald patch, tribal face paint and sweat streaming down his face - staring at me in a deranged but enlightened manner. He'd have ripped the heads off his teddies and strung them up and maybe lit a little fire and be puffing deliriously on an opium pipe, gazing at me through the thick smoke and jungle incense whilst muttering 'The horror, the horror!'.

Luckily, Mum and Mike came back before any of this could materialise. But, I'm keeping my eyes peeled...

"He was close. He was real close. I couldn't see him yet but I could feel him, as if the boat was being sucked up river and the water was flowing back to the jungle. Whatever was going to happen, it wasn't going to be the way they called it back in Nha Trang."

x

Man, it's cold!

It is cold today. Super cold. Super duper cold. Super duper cold with hundreds and thousands. Super duper cold with hundreds and thousands and a glace cherry. Sup- well I'm sure you get the idea.

Today I wore, 2 pairs of socks, fleecey-insidey boots, thermal (Icebreaker don't you know) long johns which I pulled right up and tucked my vest into, jeans, knickers (of the sensible variety), vest, cardigan, coat, scarf, bobble hat (awesome) and wooly mittens (which were a present from Rachel - thanks Rach!). And by no means was I overheating! Oh no! Aside from the frankly exhausting task of hiding the fact I was wearing nipple-high thermal leggings from people in uni, I remained decidedly tepid.

So yes, in conclusion, it was cold today.

Professor Barnabus von Chocolate is doing well, a lot less growly since the last update. Now,  he occasionally he wags his tail with me in close proximity (!). However, if I look at him too long he slowly skulks behind the nearest chair/nestle of tables.

                                                         However,

There is something that unsettles me and I must admit, I do feel rather deceived...

When we talked about getting a new dog, I had two specifications:

1. Nothing too small and/or yappy. We want something you can take up a mountain. Also, as an aside, have you ever noticed the generally the bigger the dog, the thinner the owner? There's clearly something to that.

2. Nothing with an uppy tail. And by uppy tail, I mean a tail that goes up (try to keep up with the confusing terminology here). The reason that I don't like uppy tails is simple - I do not like looking at dogs bums.

It's bad enough as it is but it's even worse when you're taking them for a walk and they go trotting off ahead and you're left there with it bang smack in the middle of your field of vision. So, to summarise, me and uppy tails don't mix.

Now, at the kennels, Barnabus has an admittedly twisty but ultimatley non-uppy tail. In fact, it appeared more corkscrewed, like a pig. Little did we know that he was in fact hiding a dark and horrible secret. Yes, you guessed it, Prof. Barnabus Von Chocolate has an uppy tail. An an uppy tail of the most sensational variety in fact, it actually spirals up. As if just bending skywards wasn't enough, he has to flaunt it by saying 'Yes, my tail goes up. In fact it goes so up that it has to go down before it can go back up again!'.

I would get a picture of it but as his tail automatically drops whenever I enter a room, it's kind of hard. But I will endeavour and I will succeed, eventually...

Professor Barnabus: A study

I feel perhaps I should give you some background knowledge on our good friend Barney.

Name: Professor Barnabus von Chocolate
Age: Around 3 years
Breed: Not sure. We think he may include Greyhound and Australian Shepherd
Distinguishing features: Awesome colouring, twirly tail
Where we got him from: Bridgend Dogs Trust  (excellent shelter, would totes recommend)
Where he came from: A house packed with dogs where he never went out. He was rescued along with his sister who was rehomed before him. He was never house trained or taught any particular special moves. We think he may have been beaten and is very shy.
Favourite things: Mike and cheese
Least favourite things: Getting up early, having his picture taken and me

Photographic evidence (Don't buy a Blackberry, the cameras are rubbish):

I appreciate the quality of these pictures is shockingly bad, but I wanted to point out just how much Barney loves giving me eye contact. He could gaze into my eyes for ever and ever. Look at him, it's like he's staring directly into my soul...not.

Seriously, if he could look any further away his eyes would roll completely round the other way. He'd actually be able to see his own retina.

He does this funny thing where he looks everywhere but at you, and occasionally flicks his eyes your way, as if to say 'She's still looking at me'. I've never seen a dog so interested in the ceiling before.

To his credit, he is very, very intelligent (a dog doesn't become a professor for nothing). He can open doors (in both directions) and seems to have a sixth sense for whenever I'm trying to subtley point a camera at him. He can also emit a heart wrenchingly forlorn howl.

Also, look how cute he is in the second photo cwtching up to those teddies.

To be continued....(better photos to come when he can actually handle the SLR)